Reasons for limiting Microsoft contractors’ access are bogus

I appreciate Janet Tu’s article “Microsoft to restrict contractor access” [Microsoft Pri0, July 19] but I would like to point out a few matters. It’s important to get the whole picture and not take whatever Microsoft says at face value.

Because of a successful class-action lawsuit against Microsoft, which was settled in 2000, Microsoft worried that it gave the appearance of using “permatemps,” which are long-term “temporary” employees. To give the false impression that it did not use permatemps, Microsoft instituted a policy where, per a 2000 article in The New York Times, “to make clear that the temps it hires are not permanent employees, the company requires those temp workers who stay at Microsoft for 12 months to leave the company for at least 100 days.”

Microsoft claims the new rules will help safeguard intellectual property and confidential info. That’s nonsense. If some unscrupulous contractor wanted to compromise Microsoft security, they could very well do it while working there. Plus, full-timers are probably just as likely to commit these kinds of security breaches. Microsoft’s excuse is bogus.

While contractors may not need access to Microsoft buildings to do their jobs, they absolutely need access to the company’s network. Again, Microsoft’s assertion is specious and highly suspicious.

Thus, it’s pretty clear to me that Microsoft is once again trying to cover its derriere to give the impression, once again, that it doesn’t hire permatemps.

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